1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to systems and methods designed to maximize the efficiency of manufacturing products. More particularly, the present invention relates to a turnkey system for relating product design information to manufacturing capabilities across a range of manufacturers and manufacturing equipment. The present invention relates to systems and methods to enable manufacturers to optimize productivity.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Goods manufacturers have long been the driving force of much of the country's economy. This community is competing in world markets and must strive for benchmarking goods and services as “best in class.” One type of manufacturer of interest in regard to the present invention is the machined component parts manufacturer, although that is not a limitation of the present invention. This type of manufacturer generally uses processes involving the machining and fabrication of metals, sheet metal, and composite materials based upon customer specifications. Machining companies must be prepared, equipped and trained to produce a wide variety of precision parts for companies that design and assemble guidance systems, space communications devices, navigation equipment, pressure vessels, and advanced medical devices, among many others.
However, a competitive global market and substantial pressure to reduce pricing has produced considerable challenge for today's manufacturers. Specific challenges small and medium manufacturers are facing include:                Aggressive competition from the European Market, Mexico and Southeast Asia        Aging ownership of companies without transition plans        Contraction of supply chain options        Stringent supply chain requirements for quality, delivery and cost        The nation's changing demographic that is forcing large companies to diversify their supply chains to reflect their customer baseAs a result, there has been a substantial decline in the number of such businesses and, relatedly, the number of people employed in this traditional manufacturing sector. As indicated above, the machining sector includes, generally, those organizations that build the parts that go into end-use products, from aircraft to motor vehicles. That job loss may have a detrimental effect on the country's future ability to manufacture supplies that it needs. Further, it may widen existing income gaps between service sector and manufacturing sector jobs, increase competition for low-skill jobs, and reduce the manufacturing sector's competitive edge as the aging skilled workforce is not replaced.        
The competition for manufacturers involved with private (commercial) and public (government, including defense) customers is increasing dramatically, even after many years of contraction of prime and second-tier manufacturers in the defense industrial base. Over approximately the last 25 years, the number of US-based Small to Medium Enterprise (SME) defense industry manufacturing suppliers has been reduced from 130,000 to 30,000 due to, among other things, mergers and acquisitions by major defense contractors. That contraction has resulted in the direct and indirect elimination of more than two million jobs in the defense sector. In addition, the associated pricing pressures have produced the effect of extending the necessary useful life of many product types, including critical weapon systems, not only because of order reductions, but because of reduction in research and development spending and the procurement of fewer new products. For example, many aircraft in the current operational Air Force are more than 20 years old. Those and other defense systems are expected to be useable for much longer periods of time, while the availability of replacement parts for those systems diminishes as the number of replacement parts required drops over that time period while remaining a critical need to ensure that the system at issue remains viable for its expected service life.
Most Prime (direct contractual relationship with the customer) and Original Equipment Manufacturing (OEM) contractors have recognized these pressures and are defining new strategies that will dramatically change the requirements for the supply chain and suppliers within that chain. For example, the aerospace and defense and commercial Primes and OEMs are transforming themselves from original manufacturers into final assemblers in response to:                increased competition in both commercial and defense sectors;        downward cost pressures from the Department of Defense        increased outsourcing to foreign suppliersThe reconfiguration requires 1st Tier suppliers to manage the bulk of the supply chain and requires 2nd and 3rd Tier suppliers to convert their operations to high mix/low volume production and upgrade the skill sets of their production workers.        
This country's SME manufacturers have been the foundation for many industry manufacturing supply chains. Yet, many SME manufacturers face significant barriers that prevent them from participating in the supply chains of today, and certainly of tomorrow. These barriers include complex legal and financial bid requirements; a lack of access to technology; the lack of a skilled workforce; the lack of an innovation culture; and the lack of a culture to strive for “continuous improvement.” Other significant barriers include the inability of the workforce to read and/or translate technical data packages into shop floor level manufacturing specifications and proper pricing and shortage of skilled workers. In general, it is becoming increasingly difficult to compete effectively in the manufacture of products as such products become more sophisticated, require the use of complex design and manufacturing tools, are the subject of variations in their design and manufacture, and the workforce becomes less capable of matching the equipment design and operation sophistication.
In order to assist manufacturers of any size to rapidly respond competitively to product manufacture requests, what is needed is a system and related method to enable them to generate or obtain effective technical data packages and have the ability to carry out the steps necessary to perform in a timely and cost effective manner. Unfortunately, most manufacturing supply chains are vulnerable to interruption to some degree due to a range of limitations to be described herein. Anywhere along that chain, the manufacturer may be prone to a switch from a profitable operation to a manufacturing nightmare. For example, manufacturers with Computerized Numerical Control (CNC) manufacturing machines use high quality mechanical and electronic components to produce precision parts to the required specifications, and they require control instructions established by software programs to establish the proper operation sequence (process), tool path, travel rate, rotational speed and direction, and any number of other detailed part or tool manipulations. Any of the steps carried out along the way from initial product design to fabrication completion may be subject to error.
It is to be noted for the purpose of describing the present invention that, in general, there are two basic steps to creating an actionable CNC program under current manufacturing methods:                1. Development of the process plan (sequence of operations); and        2. Generation of the computer programming codes that are tool path codes based on part geometry and sequence of operations, an example of which is commonly referred to in the manufacturing community and herein as the G-code used to control numerically controlled and CNC machine tools as developed by the Electronic Industries Alliance.Individual manufacturers tend to create their own CNC programming codes suitable for their own machines in their own facilities. In general, those codes cannot be translated for use on different machines located in different facilities. Therefore, if that particular manufacturer is no longer available as a supplier, the production of the product using the proprietary G-codes must be re-created in a new facility with different CNC machinery. That can be an acute problem for others in the supply chain leading to the product consumer.        
The current process for designing and manufacturing parts using CNC machining has a variety of limitations identified above and noted herein in greater detail. Those limitations can generally be characterized as falling into the following specific categories: 1) purchasing issues; 2) installation issues; 3) design issues; 4) holding fixture issues; 5) conversion issues; 6) process planning issues; 7) machine coding and language issues; 8) Posting issues; and 9) prove out issues. Each limitation will be described in turn.
There is an inherent lack of communication between purchasing agents and shop floor personnel. This lack of communication involves, but is not limited to, what type of machine, tool orientation or axis, tooling to employ with the machine, machine options suitable for the manufacturing project and so forth. That is, each participant may have a specific opinion about how best to approach the task. Each suggestion may have merit but the bottom line is that this uncertainty and impingement on decision making slows the manufacturing process and tends to lead to customized problem solving. Further, this communication problem can obscure the function of purchasing the right equipment for the project, resulting in further delays related to equipment purchase lead time requirements. Moreover, the uncertainty can result in the decision to acquire a machine considered suitable without an effective evaluation as to whether existing tooling otherwise considered inefficient will suffice for the project. Finally, CNC machine code files, which is, in effect, software, often must be purchased in a form that is compatible with the coding structure of the machine or machines at the shop, regardless of any original coding that may have been associated with the manufacturer of the part, including any proprietary coding structure (referred to herein as the Post code). Unfortunately, there may be compatibility issues between the purchased Post code and the required machine configuration.
When a machine is purchased for the purpose of carrying out a particular manufacturing project, that machine is setup using the supplier's installation schedule. That schedule may or may not be compatible with the manufacturer's needs. In addition, the machine's operating parameters, including its controller configuration are ordinarily pre-set at the factory. That configuration may be inaccurate or incompatible and is generally not checked by the installer. Further, safety barriers on the machine may not be properly checked to fit the manufacturer's needs. Other common problems associated with an initial machine purchase that lead to delays in the installation portion of the overall process of moving from a product order to its manufactured completion include, but are not limited to, different delivery times for machine parts, power supply delays and compressed air installation delays.
The manufacture of complex and other parts using sophisticated CNC machines requires substantial design skills. Many company design staff, whether trained engineers, inexperienced interns or high school graduates, particularly at small and medium enterprises, lack the knowledge and understanding of CNC operations and full CNC machine capabilities. As a result, the Computer Aided Design (CAD) portion of the overall manufacturing process may be delayed as design staff gain sufficient understanding of the CNC equipment. Even then, the designers tend to model the desired part incorrectly leading to design geometries that are incompatible with CNC machine functions. Correcting those errors causes a delay in the process. In addition, most available CAD models are not designed to generate manufacturing configurations that are compatible with existing CNC machine configurations. This forces Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM) programmers on the shop floor tasked with programming the manufacturing machine to re-create a compatible CAD model before proceeding with CAM programming. In some instances, the “on-the-fly” configuration changes that result from the inconsistency between CAD and CAM may not be saved for future reference, leading to the possibility of a repeat of the same delayed design correction process.
An important aspect of the product machining process is the holding fixture or fixtures used to retain a work piece in position during the machining process. These holding fixtures and related tooling usually are not included in the technical data package. That is not particularly unusual as the technical data package ordinarily is not specific to that level of detail. Any fixtures that may be called out are as likely as not to be outdated for the selected CNC machine. Further, any fixtures that might be called out in a technical data package may be disregarded because their associated controlling programs are incompatible with the control arrangements for the CNC machine to be used. Manufacturers may attempt to address their holding fixture needs for a project by attempting to retrofit old fixtures to conform to new fixture needs. That effort alone requires additional tooling for the fixture retrofit and extends the time associated with this step of the entire manufacturing process. As with other stages of the existing manufacturing process, the holding fixture stage often involves customized one-time efforts and the records of the fixture making and/or selection process are not maintained. As a result, that “learning” is not transferred, either within that facility or manufacturer or to another manufacturer who may have an interest in acquiring it. Finally, a manufacturer may settle on a holding fixture arrangement for a particular part or set of parts and never deviate from that arrangement, thereby avoiding the opportunity to make improvements to enhance machine compatibility and/or increase the efficiency of the fabrication process. Both of these effects will lead to delays in the optimal manufacturing process.
As noted earlier, an aspect of the fabrication process is the conversion of control files supplied in a technical data package into coding suitable for use with the particular CNC machine selected for the task. Initially, conversions are made, often without checking for errors in the original files, such as unintended geometry errors, before making the conversion. The errors thus are converted to create post codes that are wrong. Further, the coding errors that may be translated may also extend to the corresponding features and tolerances for other related tooling and tool paths during the CAM process. These features and tolerances and their related programming may therefore also require correction. Moreover, the native programming codes are generally modeled to process the part production at either the high end or the low end of a specified tolerance range. That is, they are not normalized to a midrange of the tolerance. This may result in production of multiple parts that provide no leeway for tolerance ranges of other parts that should be coupled to the manufactured part. If the machine codes are instead provided based on middle of the tolerance scale geometries, fewer finished part errors are likely to occur. Finally, in some instances, the CAD models of the technical data package imported into the Post coding are not accurately convertible, resulting in an incomplete or corrupted machining model. They must then be reconfigured or the process started from scratch to address the resulting errors. This, too, is a delay in the overall fabrication process.
The traditional manufacturing process plan often calls for the use of too many machines and too many setups. That is, an optimal manufacturing process will involve the use of only enough CNC machines necessary to make the part and only enough tool switch-outs to complete the manufacture, no more and no less. The use of extra machines and extra setups causes delays in the overall process. Further, present processes have delays resulting from the selection of the wrong fixtures and tools. Moreover, in many plants, there is insufficient interaction between the machine programmers and the fixture and tooling personnel. As a result, machine crashes may occur due to poorly designed fixture clearances.
The array of CAD and CAM programs is wide and variations can occur within the same organization. These variations can happen due to differences in CAD platforms employed to generate CAD programs, and differences in CAM platforms and programs used to generate G and M Post codes for CNC machine control. It can be seen, then, that computer program and coding differences across platforms, across departments of an organization and between functions may slow the manufacturing process at a minimum, and cause substantial errors in the manufacture of a part. The CAM programmers may be restricted by existing fixture design geometries and/or incorrect part model geometry received from the CAD programming when they program the CNC machines. Nevertheless, while they may note that G and Mo coding instructions they receive from the CAD programming may not be applicable for the machines in use, they must still proceed with those Post codes. This process of incompatible functions and restrictions on programming corrections delays the manufacturing process.
Once the process plan has been generated for the manufacture of a part, tooling and fixture files designated by the created CAD program is imported into a CAM program to generate a “smart” model of the part, which is the CAD part model with attached CAM data used to “prove out” the manufacture of the part on the designated CNC machine or machines. Next, Post coding is initiated to generate G and M codes for the CNC machine selected to prove out the CAD/CAM model. Based on the model and G and M codes, it may be necessary to acquire or produce special tooling and/or fixtures to ensure the proper setup for the prove out machine. This stage of the manufacturing process may be slowed substantial by the need to create custom tooling and/or fixtures. In addition, there may be Post coding and prove out related delays.
In regard to Post coding problems at the prove out stage, it is to be noted that the people on the floor assigned to program the CNC machine must choose the correct machine controller Post code—if included in the CAM Post library provided by the CAM programmer. Otherwise, the machine programmer may have to modify existing Post codes to meet those controller configurations. If commercial Post writing software is employed for the machine, those manual modifications made by the machine programmer that third-party Post writing software may automatically make changes to those manual modifications, or the manual modifications may carry through all Post writing generated by the third-party software. The manual changes may not be sufficient or complete. These modifications and any inconsistencies with respect to the third-party Post writing software may result in CNC machine errors and, possibly, crashes. These errors and delays slow the prove out process.
In addition to the Post coding difficulties that may be experienced in the prove out of suitable CNC machine operation for part production, there are often difficulties at the machine. One delay results from the setup person at the machine seeking to interact with the CNC programmer to discuss adjustments that he/she observes are required. Alternatively, the setup person may simply make the changes without providing any feedback to the CNC programmer. Upon that occurrence, a revision change is not carried back through the CNC, CAM or CAD programming, leading to the misperception that the designated programming is satisfactory. Backups of machine programs revised are often not made. Therefore, any setup changes that were made that corrected a discovered problem must be repeated on the next run of parts using that machine and the original CNC program. Ultimately, the setup person has substantial impact on the efficiency of the process as that person installs all fixtures and tooling, loads the CNC control program and activates a dry run. The setup person runs a single part, may make further machine adjustments to bring the part into tolerance and to machine the part properly. As often as not, machine crashes will occur from operator error, which delays the manufacturing process.
The prove out stage of the manufacturing process may take months under the current manufacturing process. That delay slows company productivity and idles an array of employees. Eventually, when a part manufacture process has been proven, the process plan and the G and M codes written are specific to the single machine where the prove out occurred, changes made may not have been documented adequately, and the process established is not easily transferred to other machines, particularly those with different controllers. Therefore, the existing process may continue production delays even when at the production stage after prove out has, in theory, been completed.
The current CNC machine fabrication processes can take anywhere from two to 10 months from initial part fabrication conception to production ready. That time frame is unacceptable in today's economic environment, where efficiency is of substantial importance. What is needed is a system and related method to substantial reduce the manufacturing preparation process. Further, what is needed is a system and related method to make compatible an array of CAD and CAM programming options, Post coding and available CNC machines and machine setups so as to substantial minimize or eliminate the errors inherent in the use of different devices to get to production readiness.